Playin’ The Edge

I was thinking more about yesterday’s quote - “Acceptance of the unacceptable is the greatest source of grace in this world”.  Sometimes I get lost in what exactly grace is.  So my short hand way of reminding myself to go “Haaaaaaa” - a big noisy exhale.  

Have you ever done that one in yoga class?  It’s great.  It makes you realize all the holding you do, silently carrying all that breath and tension.  With one exhale you feel yourself let go of all the excess, the worry, the resisting.  It feels like you’re left with just what you need.  You’re in a state of calm.  You’re going with the flow and trusting it will all work out exactly how it needs to.   To me, that’s grace.

But acceptance is hard.  I was thinking about my son’s recent swimming experiences.  He flunked his last level of swimming not once, or twice but three times.  And he loves to swim, it’s not like he was quivering in the corner, he loves it.  I couldn’t accept it. 

Is my kid a Failure?  Is he lacking in some important way?  Is he going to flunk out of school too before he makes it to junior high?  You know, working through all the consequences and “what does this mean”  questions which is such of waste of time because there’s no way we can know.  It only increases the blood pressure.

I finally put him in a private lesson so he could pass the damn thing and take the next level with his cousin this summer.  The teacher was able to get him to understand the expectations which really helped.  They’re supposed to hold things like Starfish, floating on their back for 5 seconds. 

Only no one had told him that, so he’d come up after say, one and a half seconds and wouldn’t pass that requirement. So this teacher told him he needed to stay on his back while she counted to five and sure enough he was like, oh ok, no big deal.  And this time he passed.

So this summer he went into the next level of swimming with his cousin.  I was being really careful to manage my expectations.  To accept whatever was going to happen.  This is his swimming experience, he’ll get it at some point, this isn’t about my timelines. 

Didn’t he pass with flying colors.  There were little check marks next to the long list of stuff they need to show they can do.  I was shocked.  And i couldn’t accept it.

Maybe the teacher has gone insane.  The kids were a little wrangy waiting for their turns to swim, maybe he passed them so he wouln’t have to deal with them anymore.  And then I thought no Corilee, noisy exhale time (Haaaaaa!) just accept it.   Find that state of graceful calm about this too.

We went to the beach the other day and there were some awesome waves coming in.  Angus and I got about waist deep and waited for the waves coming in.  “Here it comes here it comes here it comes!” 

We’d either stand strong or dunk underneath them.  And then we’d feel the sand move under our feet as the wave sucked back down the beach.   Afterwards he played in the waves himself and whether he got hit in the face or bowled over by them he had a blast.  I kept an eye on him but I didn’t worry because he’s a strong little swimmer and he’ll be just fine.

 When I was going to university at Simon Fraser, just outside Vancouver I was also going out with a guy who lived at home with his parents.  They were in Coquitlam, an upper middle class white suburb of large homes perched on the side of a big hill.  I’d go to his house after our long day at school and we’d hang out, watch some TV, drink some beers, you know, live the student life. 

One night at 2:00 a.m. I was driving home from his place and the neighbourhood was dead quiet.  I drove down the back of the hill toward the Fraser River. A women was standing in the middle of the road waving me down.  I stopped and she promptly got into the passenger seat of my seat without saying anything and waved ahead like she wanted me to drive. 

She was agitated.  She was nicely dressed. She was a native woman and I couldn’t figure out what she was doing in the middle of the street in this neighbourhood in the middle of the night.

She was also very drunk so when I asked her where she lived she pointed but her words were slurred so I couldn’t understand them.  I said, “it’s ahead here?”.  And she nodded so I drove.  I headed into the city because that seemed to be where she was pointing.  Not long in the warm car she fell asleep. 

I couldn’t figure out what to do.  I’d shake her awake to ask if we were getting closer and she’d nod and point or slur a few words and then go back to sawing  logs in my passenger seat.  After a while she was sleeping too deeply to wake her up at all.  So I drove for a while longer and got to the South Granville area which is  a safe ‘Restoration Hardware’ and trendy health food store kind of shopping neighbourhood.  

I was frustrated.  I didn’t want to go right downtown Vancouver because that might have meant letting her out in a more questionable neighbourhood.  So I stopped at a bus stop, shook her awake, opened her door and said, ‘I’m sorry, this is as far as I can go, I don’t know where you live but I hope you get home ok’.  She looked at me and grunted and got out.

I drove home fighting with myself.  Should I have done something different?  Could I have somehow found out where she lived?  Was there somewhere else I could have dropped her?  Did I do enough?  Why didn’t I ask her name?  How did something so weird just happen?

A long time later I heard that a man named Robert Pickton, a pig farmer near the Fraser River in Coquitlam was being charged with multiple murders of women.  He would go to the Downtown Eastside neighbourhood in a van and pick up groups of women, inviting them to party at his house.  They were often addicts, sometimes native and usually sextrade workers.

They found remains and DNA of missing women all over his farm.  I turned off the news whenever they got into details of what he did to them because it made me sick.  It’s said that he bragged about killing 50 women.  His farm was down the hill from where I picked up my passenger that night long ago when I was in school.  I’ve thought about it a lot.  I know that night years ago,  she was at that farm.

I wonder what she saw that night.  She was too healthy to be a hardcore addict and not dressed like a sextrade worker.  Is that why she got away?  Did she leave friends behind that night?  Did she see them again?  Whatever she encountered it made her hightail it out of there, walk a long way up a steep hill and wave me down for a ride.  No wonder she was agitated, she must have been terrified someone was going to come after her.

I did some Women Studies courses at the time and also worked at the student newspaper at SFU.  I’d heard about women disappearing from the Downtown Eastside neighbourhood.  People were angry that  the cops didn’t seem to care about yet another sextrade worker and addict disappearing from a rough neighbourhood.  

The Downtown Eastside lifestyle isn’t known for helping one’s longevity, I get that, but their attitude seemed to be that these victims were second class citizens not worthy of their attention.  Most of the women were  far from home and out of touch with their families, their friends were other addicts, they had no one to fight for them.

Pickton only got charged with 6 counts of second degree murder.  The prosecutors had proof of another 20 but the 6 were enough to lock him away for the rest of his miserable life.   He must spend his time in jail alone, he wouldn’t survive long in general population.

Yesterday the Vancouver police issued an unqualified apology to the families of the women who were murdered by him.  The deputy chief said, “We’re sorry from the bottom of our hearts that we did not catch him sooner and protect more women from being harmed.”  He said they should have done better so that more lives could have been saved.

When I think about the passenger in my car that dark night a long time ago, I’m so grateful she got away.   I still wish I could have gotten her home.  I hope she’s having a good life with people who care about her, wherever she is.

The other day I was struck with the most incredible feelings of sadness.  I just felt dead-eyed and uninterested in anything.  There wasn’t any major crises going on.   So I had to really dig in to think of what might be bugging me. 

It finally came to me that I’ve been having nasty thoughts about taking the summer off.  Taking the summer off has been one of the hardest things I’ve ever done.  What a wacko hey?  Welcome to my world.  I always think that i can’t be *that* Type A because there are always people who push harder than i do.  I  can’t be a real Type A because i’m happy to take a vacation, I’m happy to kick back with a glass of wine.  But i think I need to accept the fact that I, Corilee, am pretty darn Type A.  And taking the summer off is hard.

When I dug into what was going through my head, it went like this.  Every time i did something i enjoyed I’d think - yeah i won’t be able to do *that* when i’m working.  And when something happening that I didn’t enjoy, I’d think, god how long will I be dealing with *that* instead of escaping to a glorious job?  In other words,  I may be out of work forever, blah blah blah, who’ll hire me, nasty negative thought, blah.   I’d locked myself into a spot between the proverbial rock and a hard place.  Whatever it was, good or bad, it totally sucked.  No wonder I felt depressed.

The crazy thing is, I wasn’t fully aware of these thoughts but they were bumming me right out.  Especially the oh-woe-is-me stuff about getting a job.  Who was it that wrote about our Big Self and our Small Self?  My Big Self is the one that is fully rested, grown up, trusts the Universe and absolutely believes that the right job will come around with my name on.  And I believe it for everyone, not just me.  If you seek, throwing your little resume out to the wind, you will darn well find the job with your name on it.

So where was this Small Self thinking coming from?  The wheedling little smarmy fearful voice with the garbage mouth that makes me feel bad?

My Mom gave me a two year old Oprah magazine (gotta love Oprah Mag, they just don’t age like the others) and there’s an Eckhart Tolle interview in the back.  He says that becoming aware of your negative obsessive thoughts is your first step to stop identifying with them.

And yes, as soon as I was fully aware of these nasty job hunting thoughts I went, ewwwwww, like I’d found a dead mouse in my bathtub.  I don’t want that going through my head, I don’t want them anywhere near me! 

I was blown away about how easy it was to unconsciously think my thoughts.  How “natural” they felt just because I’m uncomfortable with the uncertainty around my employment future.

So now I’ve been lying in wait for these thoughts.  When I wake up from the most awesome nap or have a good walk with my baby I used to think - this will be tough to do when I get a job.  Now I think - I will find time for the important things when I’m working.  Let’s just enjoy it, wow I have the summer off, how amazing is this?  I’ll remember this fondly when it’s February and snowing and I’m at a desk grinding out some task.

Tolle says in the Oprah interview that you’re never more yourself than when you’re still.  Who you really are is in that space between the thoughts.  If you can find the stillness, find your breath, let the stream of obsessive thoughts go, then you’ll find that sweet spot.  Relax into that space. 

He says, that’s where the peace and joy is.  Those qualities that are already inside us - not waiting for the perfect experience out there.  They’re not waiting for us to accumulate that next cool thing.  Or find the sexy job.  It’s right here in the present, between the fearful thoughts about the future and the regretful thoughts about the past.

And I’m taking that a step further.  Who I really am is also in the space between jobs.  Often I’ve felt very defined by what I do, which I know is silly but there it is.  This summer is an opportunity to look at who I am without my functions and skills being defined by someone else. 

So, what are my creative urges like when there’s no creative  job outlet?  What are my needs around being with people when I don’t work intensely with folks day in and day out?  What’s my energy like when I can  completely define the activities of my day? Maybe this summer is a useful experiment.

Tolle says that you can use anything for a reminder to bring a conscious presence to your everyday life.  It reminded me of something Frank Jude Boccio, Mindfulness Yoga guy, said.  He moved to a place where he could hear the trains run regularly.  Initially he thought it might be annoying.  Then he decided to use it as his Mindfulness Bell like the Zen monks do.  So whenever he heard the train, he would stop whatever he was doing and take 3 conscious breaths.  Tolle suggests we use everyday stuff, washing our hands, having a glass of water to remind us to check in and get conscious again.

Tolle says that we’re always obsessing about our problems.  He likes to ask - what problem do you have at this moment?   And he’s right.  If I considered my jobless state a problem (which i don’t like to do but let’s say for example sake) am I really experiencing this Problem while I make coffee?  Read the paper?  Feed Leo banana chunks and hear him go MAMAMAMA!! when he’s ready for more? (btw that’s baby for “Yo!  Bitch!  Need more banana chunks ovah heah!” Yes Leo is s stevedore from Joisey some days) .

No there’s no problem.  Any problem is more about what my mind has concluded about the circumstances around me than anything about what I experience moment to moment.  It’s about my thoughts.  And I can be aware of them, and come up with better ones.  You know, so they can stop bumming me out.

Money is a good example too.  I know a few households these days that have money issues, like less coming in than they need, for whatever reason.  Like us. But it’s really interesting to see how people deal with it.  Some don’t even seem to see it as a Problem.  It’s like, well yeah we’re depending on the line of credit these days.  But whatever. 

Whereas other folks don’t seem to be as relaxed about it.  They buy something they consider a necessity but feel guilty about it.  They feel stressed, they feel helpless. I’ve noticed it doesn’t seem to relate to the size of anyone’s debt, it’s all about how they think and feel about it.

So I”ll continue sorting out the “problem” of taking the summer off by seeing how many beaches and farmers markets I can visit over the summer.  I think I’ll also make jam for the first time in a million years.  Maybe ginger peach the minute I see local peaches in the store.  Take my kids on a couple of day trips.  Deal with this “problem” the best way a Type A person like me can.

Lately I’ve been realizing how wussy my workouts have been.  I like to workout.  I like to sweat and love that feeling that my body has *done* something.  I’ve been exercising pretty often lately but I’m holding back.  I read an interview with Jillian Michaels who said she runs stairs holding a 100 bag over her head.  While I don’t want to do that workout it made me think, wow i could push a little harder. 

And at the gym i was stretching and watching what some of the gals were doing in the weight area.  One woman was face down with her middle on the ball and then she lifted both legs, a million times or so. Again, i thought wow, i could be doing a bit more especially if that perky butt is a side benefit. 

A couple of the chicks were setting up a stepper thingy,  making it hip height.  Then they jumped with both feet, bounding up into the air, landing on the step and then they’d step off again  and repeat it a bunch of times.  I’m not sure that’s a workout for me.  I’d catch my knee or foot on my way up and then fall on my head on the other side,  but again i thought, wow i sure could be doing more.

I planned a gym visit yesterday and as I was dressing I made the committment to give it my all, especially with the ol’ glutes.  And my next  thought was, yeah but i don’t want to work out too hard because I don’t want it to impact tomorrow’s run.   And then I stopped myself.  What is this mythical run at some later date?  Why do I need to control the future?  Or sorry, *attempt* to control the future?  

Maybe the run doesn’t happen - i get sick, i lose a pile of sleep tonight, my baby is teething, it’s a monsoon downpour, or heck i get hit by a bus before i get my running sneaks on.  Why am I planning for this run tomorrow instead of focusing on the workout I’m just about to do?

I mean, wouldn’t it be great to be so sore that it impacts my run!  When’s the last time *that* happened?  But really, if my butt was that sore, I could run a flat route, shorten my run, or just walk more - there are a whole bunch of options that could deal with this “problem” that hasn’t even been problematic yet.

It was a total Living In The Moment epiphany, except the workout version.  Because controlling the future is pretty familiar for me which is silly given how useless my attempts are.

So I did a killer workout.  I normally do the machines, so this time i did all free weights and really worked my lower body.  I did squats, 3 kinds of lunges, I laid on the ball and lifted my legs just like the woman with the perky butt. 

And this morning I wasn’t sore.  Sure I felt like i’d done something,  but it was no big deal.  No monsoons or unscheduled buses got in the way so my run happened after all.  I pushed Leo in the stroller for 30 minutes and felt great.

Thank God I didn’t spend a ton of energy thinking and planning and managing for something that didn’t even happen.  I gotta learn to live in the workout moment more often.  Give it all i’ve got - Right Now.  Hmmmm, if soreness is this elusive, maybe I’ll need a 100 pound bag to carry over my head after all.

Just because a thought shows up doesn’t mean you need to make it a sandwich.

Susan Stiffelman

 I finished reading Karen Connelly’s book Burmese Lessons, about her time in Burma in the mid-90s.  She’s a writer from here in Canada, a country that offers us the luxury of national politics as bland as tapioca pudding.  She goes from here to a country run by generals that is being abandoned by millions of people fleeing as refugees.  Her observations are sometimes really hard to read, a sad reminder of the kind of things people can do to one another.  She also has a keen eye for the basics of what it is to be human in the experiences she’s had.  Here are a couple excerpts:

I used to find the word homemaking vaguely embarassing.  As an occupation, it was an uninspiring potential fate.  But being among Burmese refugees and exiles in Thailand has taught me that it’s no small act to make a home.  Making a home safe enough for a child is the ordinary miracle.  How many refugees on this earth can only dream of it?  The tendency- perhaps from television images, the news clips - is to envision the displaced as herds, flocks, haunted masses carrying children and possessions on their backs, walking away, arriving at makeshift camps only to leave again.  And they are that.  But they are also individual men and women and children with the old human longing: to be held safely in their world.  Each one of them as a name.

People usually try to feed me, so that I now show up to the offices or safe houses with bags of curry or grilled chicken or mangoes, adding to the communcal meal or extended snacks that i know will be offered.  This food giving and food taking is so familiar that I sometimes forget its meaning.  We are taking care.  To take care is the great human act.  It is part of the answer to the brutality that may not touch people here directly but affects them deeply.  On the physical and metaphorical border these people inhabit, it is a daily challenge to take care of themselves, let alone others, but that is what they all do…..each one has done more than survive.  They have remained or they have become tender, alive to their own suffereing and the suffering of their people.  While I try to control my personal longings and berate myself for being too soft, they remind me that my yearnings are as basic as cooked rice.

My friend Grace had been telling me about the joys of Nordic Walking for a while.  “It’s a full body workout!”,  she’d tell me.  It’s low-impact, it’s something you can do anywhere and there are low equipment needs - it’s good for all kinds of reasons.   And I totally trust Grace.  She’s got so many cool interests and passions that when she manages to stuff another one into her busy life it’s worth taking note of.

We found a day that fit into our schedules and I met her in Mahone Bay, my favourite oozing-with-quaint town on the south shore.  We met at the general store on main street and there’s a trail just back from there that’s on an old railway bed.  I hadn’t known about it but it’s perfect for Nordic Walking -  it goes on forever, it’s flat and surrounded by beautiful woods. 

Grace first had to teach me how to use the special Nordic Walking poles.  They have rubbery handles that are easy to grip, adjustable lengths and little rubber feet that get good traction on the ground. 

I’ve seen folks using these poles around town and they use them like walking sticks.  Technically that’s not how it’s done (and it makes them pretty expensive walking sticks!).  You’re supposed to walk like a goosestepping soldier, straight arms, vigorous swing, and the pole lands on the ground just behind the line of your hip.  Then you press into the pole while you step your foot forward. 

I needed to concentrate on getting everything right, but when I did I could feel that my triceps, lats and shoulders were definitely in use.  Then when you go up or down hills, you use them more as traditional walking sticks,  they land straight down below your bent arm so your chest muscles are activated. 

After Grace teaches me the techniques we head off.  Every once in a while the rubber footies on my poles skipped off over the ground instead of planting.  We adjusted the length of my poles a few time and it improved each time. 

Grace had just come back from New York where she saw His Holiness The Dalai Lama.  It was one of those crazy synchronicity things where she decided she wanted to go, couldn’t find tickets, just happened to meet a person from NYC who could hook her up with not just tickets but VIP tickets, just happened to get the money she needed for her birthday to pay for the plane ticket, just happened to find the perfect place to stay - you get the idea. 

Oh, and the Dalai Lama blessed her kata (Tibetan silk scarf) because she just walked up to the front of the world’s largest cathedral where he was speaking and someone took it up to him.  Total synchronicity.  What a story.

And it’s funny because when she emailed me that she was going to NYC to see the Dalai Lama it was at the end of a really bad kid day for me.  I just wanted to either run away from home or sell my children to the gypsies and here’s my friend going off to do this awesome pilgrimage.  I wasn’t jealous, I was totally happy for her, but the comparison between our lives at that moment was pretty funny, in a dark sort of way. 

But that’s the life of a householder, more changing diapers than seeking out holy people.  Spending most of your energy grasping at whatever strength you have to avoid selling your children and spending the money on a nice dinner - at least on the bad days.

So I looked at my watch when we were on our way back into town and we’d been walking 2 hours.  The time had completely flown by.  I told Grace I was *starving*, so she took me to the Biscuit Eater.  It’s an oozing-with-charm combo bookstore cafe in an ancient building.  The place has, of course, awesome biscuits but I had a sandwich. 

When Grace had told me about Nordic Walking  there was a part of me that wondered if it was real exercise, you know?  Like it’s walking with some pole action, big whoop.  I wondered if  I’d really feel it or burn any calories.

After I left Grace in Mahone Bay, I drove back to Halifax and was running some errands at 3 in the afternoon.  I couldn’t figure out what was wrong with me.  I felt all wrong-headed and woozy.  Then I realized I was hungry.  Like not peckish but bottomed- out-blood-sugar-passing-out kind of hungry.  I had to grab another sandwich so  I could make it to dinner time. 

It turns out Nordic Walking is a wicked calorie burn afterall.  But you gotta do it right.  So if you happen to be near Mahone Bay and are up for a full body, calorie torching workout with great conversation, Grace will hook you up.

I was getting ready to teach Power Yoga the other day and realized that my hoodie had baby barf  or baby food on it,  something unsightly.  So I dug another hoodie out of the closet.  It was a new grey sweatshirt that I hadn’t worn much.  So I take it off at the beginning of class and about mid-way through we’re doing Cow pose with a tie and i look down and something about my arm pit catches my eye. 

My pit is full of little grey sweatshirt fuzzies.  You know how sweatshirts shed fuzzies from their underside?  Especially when they haven’t been washed much?  They were congregating in my armpit.  So my first thought was, damn, the class probably thinks i’m going Euro or hippie on them!  And I’m not! Aat least not this week.

And then I was thinking, do I try to get rid of the fuzzies?  Like actually come out of the pose and starting picking thing out of my armpits like an ape?  That seems kind of silly.  The other option is to say something and make a joke out of it for the folks who’ve noticed. 

But i’ve learned not to trot out my drama for the yoga class.  Yes, because i’m teaching i’m all too aware of the music being off or that i forgot what pose we were going to do next, or that I’m vain enough to freak out abut fuzzies in my pits.  But that fact is the folks in the class don’t want to care about that.  And I don’t want them to either.  I want them to ignore as much of life as possible while they blissfully breath and stretch.

So I let it go.  I did a “who cares” and moved on. 

It’s funny how Life constantly gives us opportunity to Let Go, or not hey?  It’s like it’s always poking us in the ribs going, let’s see, how about this?  Will this totally set you off?  Or can you let go of it?  Will this thing spin you off balance?  Or can you say “oh well!”?  What about this, will it Ruin Your Day?  Or can you find a way to laugh at it?  How often can you apply your “This Too Shall Pass” perspective to the crazy things that happen?

Because whether you’re locking your keys in the car, having a tense moment with your Significant Other or you’ve just gotten some bad news, there are always opportunities to practice keeping your balance.   Thanks Life.

A lovely quote from the Dalai Lama I noticed in my friend Rosie’s blog:

“I am nothing special,” the 14th Dalai Lama said, “but I’m warm hearted, and my mental state is quite calm.  Real healing power is a compassionate heart.  It reduces stress, and blood pressure, improves digestion, allows one to sleep soundly.”

My friend is in the midst of making a decision about moving to another place.  And I’ve been watching my own reactions to it, pretty entertaining stuff.  Because of course I’d miss her like hell but I’ve also been reacting to it from the belief that there’s a right way to make the decision.  Thinking, here are all the ducks that *should* be a row before a decision like that is made.  It’s like I believe there’s a perfect way to make a big decision.  What a load of horse puckies. 

And it’s funny because I’m one to talk, I’ve moved cities on a flyer.  Before I came to Halifax I’d visited all of once.  And look how that turned out?  Still here, still lovin’ it - but I want to continue loving it with my friend.  So I realize I’m being over-protective which is cute and annoying, especially for her I’m sure.  It’s also making me examine this knee-jerk response about there being a “right” and “perfect” way to do anything. 

I’m reading an odd book called the Disappearance of the Universe and came across this:

Do not feel bad when you temporarily lose your way….The myth of living a perfect life in terms of behavior is self-defeating and unnecessary.  All that is necessary is to be willing to receive correction….The jet airliner is always going off course, but through constant correction it arrives at its destination.  So will you arrive at your destination.  It’s a done deal; you couldn’t screw it up if you tried.  The real question is, how long do you want to prolong your suffering?

It’s true, there are so many choices we make every day.  You make a choice and then another one.  There is plenty of opportunity to adjust.  And adjust.  And adjust.  And sometimes making what appears to be a “wrong” choice can turn out well in the long run. 

I moved to Halifax to continue a relationship with a guy and then bailed after a year of living here.  I felt completely unmoored.  I didn’t know what to do.  I didn’t want to move anywhere else but hadn’t been here long enough to feel at home.  Moving here didn’t feel entirely wrong - I loved being near the water, I had a funky downtown apartment,  a decent job and the start of some good friendships.  But I felt so unsettled that it didn’t feel entirely right either. 

But over time it changed.  This is where I met HoneyBunny and I wouldn’t have met him if I lived anywhere else because he’s not going to leave.  He knows a good spot when he finds it.  So are there really any ”bad” decisions?  Or decisions that just haven’t played out yet.  Or decisions we haven’t learned a lesson about yet. 

I should have learned from my move here that sometimes decisions are neither right or wrong, they can feel both and you just have to let them run their course.  I’m getting to learn that one all over again.  Which seems to be how the best lessons come to me - repeatedly.   So I’ll stop being so protective of my friend, keep my mouth shut, be supportive and tell her how much I’ll miss her any chance I get.